Recovery made easy!

September 27, 2020September 27, 2020nutravice admin

What is recovery all about?

Everyone needs recovery time if they workout or play a sport, no question about it.

You can’t drive a car on an empty tank, your body is the exact same. You need time to let your muscles relax, replenish glycogen stores and also to build up muscle if that is one of your goals.

If you are a professional sportsman/woman. You will generally need more time off then your average exerciser. This is because you are training your body at a higher intensity, meaning your body is working harder, meaning you will need rest to recover.

Recovery includes a number of things.

Rest, time off exercise
Refuelling
Re-setting goals, if you are in a recovery stage you may want to change your goal if you have achieved it.
Motivating yourself, for a lot of people motivating themselves can be easy however when you stop exercising you may start to loose motivation even if your recovery is only a day!
Setting out a plan, this is your best opportunity to sit down and work on your training plan.

Recovery is not just for when you are injured, you should allow your body to recover at least 2 days per week.

If you are involved in 2 or more sports or exercise related hobbies, you may feel yourself wearing thin, this can have drastic changes on both your physical and mental health.

If you cannot fit in days to recover, you may need to cut back on some of your commitments.

When an athlete completes in a race or competition, they need to spend a long time after their race recovering (depending on their competition).

If you are looking at competing in a marathon or an iron man competition, there is rigorous training and dedication put into it, not just for a week or two but for a good few months. After their races, athletes usually take a break from high level competitions to allow their body to recover.

If you are competing on a smaller scale like a 1, 2, 5, 10km run/cycle/swim you may not need to train your body as much, meaning your recovery time may be less.

Foods for recovery?

flat lay photography of vegetable salad on plate — Pexels.com

Fuelling your body correctly while you are allowing your body to recover is just as important as fuelling your body while competing.

You will need to take extra care when choosing which foods you should be having while on a recovery day.

I will guide you through everything you should and shouldn’t be eating, and I’ll start right from the start.

Breakfast!

Breakfast is one of the most important meals in your day, breakfast is the first meal/food you have in a day. You are breaking your fast!

In order to have a healthy recovery breakfast you will need to find out what is actually good for you.

In the morning you should be looking at a meal like the following:

A glass of water.
A carbohydrate rich food, this can be porridge, Weetabix etc.
A piece of fruit.

The quantity of each food will change depending on your calorie goals, each meal should be roughly 1/4 of your calorie goals, this will change on a day to day basis.

If you plan on having 4 meals you may need to reduce the food quantity in each meal.

Lunch!

When you are on a recovery day, you will want to fuel up your body with carbohydrates. A great lunch for that is pasta, maybe some cold pasta from the day before.

You could also look at having a sandwich, this way you are able to add in different toppings and add as much or as little as you feel.

Healthier toppings:

Ham
Chicken
Cous Cous
Lettuce
Tomatoes
Egg

The list is truly endless, having a sandwich is very helpful for getting in your fruit and vegetables. Make sure you also keep an eye on how much water you are drinking. I like to try to have a glass of water with every meal.

Dinner:

Dinner may be your last meal of the day, you want to go out with a bang, while keeping healthy.

A lot of people may find dinner difficult to make, especially when you are trying to keep healthy. Do not go overboard with trying to stay healthy!

Yes you should try to have a healthy meal, but do not feel you have to go crazy with eating healthy.

Everyone likes to have a treat meal every once in a while, I know I do anyways!

Here are some ideas I like to make for my dinner after a training session, while trying to add in as much fruit and vegetables as I can.

Veggie burger with a side of chips
Homemade pizza with my favourite toppings
Steak with some rice and vegetables
Chicken breast with vegetables, potatoes, carrots, peas etc.

A lot of people tend to eat salads as a way to eat healthy, this is not always the case!

You may not find salads filling or even that nice. Why eat them?

There are so many other meals you can eat rather than eating salads all of the time. You may like salads and that is great, but make sure you still are eating a balanced diet, meaning you change up what you eat.

I hope you enjoyed reading this blog all about recovery. If you did make sure you check out my other blogs and also sign up for the newsletter.

If you are planning on competing in a race of competition you may like to read my blog all about preparing for a race. Check it out here.

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If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see a blog about, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com

A guide to becoming vegan!

September 19, 2020September 19, 2020nutravice admin

plate of raw onions placed on wooden board with potatoes and chopped mushrooms — Pexels.com

What does vegan mean?

“A person who does not eat or use animal products”

This definition was taken from www.dictionary.com

What you avoid as a vegan: Meat, eggs, dairy, honey, milk and also animal products including clothes such as leather.

Although you cannot have any of these products, there are vegan based businesses out there that provide products that are vegan friendly such as almond milk, tofu etc.

A vegan mainly gets their energy sources from plant based foods. For example, vegetables, nuts and seeds, fruit.

If you are thinking about going vegan you may be startled with the amount of foods you cannot eat, but over the past few years in particular there has been more and more vegan foods and food variations coming out.

Check out the table below to see what you can have as a replacement when being vegan!

Milk	Soya milk
Chicken	Tofu
Cheese	Almond or cashew cheese
Honey	Maple syrup

Check out this list of businesses that are vegan friendly!

Websites with resources for being vegan:

Veganeire.com

Ilovevegan.com

Vegansociety.com

Vegan.com

Vegan Recipes

These recipes are taken from bbcgoodfood.com!

Satay sweet potato curry

Prep: 15 mins Serves: 4

Cook: 45 mins

Ingredients:

1 tbsp coconut oil

1 onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, grated

Thumb-sized piece ginger, grated

3 tbsp Thai red curry paste (check the label to make sure it is vegan)

1 tbsp smooth peanut butter

500g sweet potato, peeled and cut into chunks

400ml can coconut milk

200g bag spinach

1 lime, juiced

Cooked rice, to serve (optional)

Dry roasted peanuts, to serve (optional)

Method:

Melt 1 tbsp coconut oil in a saucepan over a medium heat and soften 1 chopped onion for 5 mins. Add 2 grated garlic cloves and a grated thumb-sized piece of ginger, and cook for 1 min until fragrant.

Stir in 3 tbsp Thai red curry paste, 1 tbsp smooth peanut butter and 500g sweet potato, peeled and cut into chunks, then add 400ml coconut milk and 200ml water.

Bring to the boil, turn down the heat and simmer, uncovered, for 25-30 mins or until the sweet potato is soft.

Stir through 200g spinach and the juice of 1 lime, and season well. Serve with cooked rice, and if you want some crunch, sprinkle over a few dry roasted peanuts.

Vegan sausage rolls

Prep: 20 mins Serves: 10

Cook: 50 mins

Ingredients:

250g chestnut mushrooms

3 tbsp olive oil

2 leeks, finely chopped

2 large garlic cloves, crushed

1 tbsp finely chopped sage leaves

1 tbsp brown rice miso

2 tsp Dijon mustard

30g chestnuts, very finely chopped

70g fresh white breadcrumbs

1 x 320g sheet ready-rolled puff pastry (not the all butter version)

Plain flour for dusting

Dairy-free milk (like soya milk), to glaze

Method:

Tip the mushrooms into a food processor and pulse until they are very finely chopped. Put half the olive oil in a large frying pan, add the leeks along with a pinch of salt and fry gently for 15 mins or until softened and golden brown. Scrape the leeks out of the pan, into a bowl and set aside to cool a little.

Heat the remaining oil in the pan and fry the mushrooms for 10 mins over a medium heat. Add the garlic, sage, miso and mustard, and fry for a further minute. Leave to cool slightly.

Heat the oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Tip the mushroom mixture into the bowl with the leeks, then add the chestnuts and breadcrumbs. Season, then mix everything together until you have a slightly stiff mixture.

Unravel the pastry on a floured surface, then roll the pastry out so that one side measures 43 cm. Mould the mushroom and leek mixture into a sausage shape down the centre of the pastry, then bring the pastry up around the filling and seal along the seam with a fork. Cut into ten pieces. Lay on a parchment-lined baking sheet and brush each piece with milk. Bake for 25 mins or until deep, golden brown. Leave to cool a little and sprinkle with sesame seeds before serving.

A very big problem when people go vegan, is the limited protein they intake. Although a lot of animal based products contain protein, so do a lot of vegan friendly foods.

Vegan friendly protein sources:

Tofu
Green peas
Seitan
Lentils
Quinoa
Soy milk
Seeds

People often go vegan to reduce the number of animals killed, not necessarily a nutritional diet. Keep this into consideration!

If you are vegan, you will still need to exercise and stay active, check out ways you can get started with exercising!

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If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see a blog about, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com

Preparing for a race or competition!

September 13, 2020September 13, 2020nutravice admin

Preparing for a competition, can be difficult, check out this blog on how you can achieve your best results while competing.

If you are competing in a competition or race you have most likely trained for it, if not you will need to start.

When training you will need to make sure you balance your recovery, sleep, nutrition and your exercising. These are four very important factors of a healthy lifestyle. Check out a blog on how you can balance your life, here!

When should I start training?

You should start training as soon as you can. If your race or competition is a long time away, you may only need to be doing light exercises and not heavy training. If you start training too early you may not be able to keep it up until your competition.

2-3 weeks before an event you should be training at a high intensity, when you train at a high intensity it is very important you fuel and refuel your body correctly. You should also make sure you are keeping clean, not sharing any food or water as your immune system is low when you train at a high intensity.

Keeping clean is vital when preparing for a competition.

The week before your competition you should begin to taper your training so you do not injure yourself before the event. This will also allow your body to collect and store carbohydrates to use for your race/competition.

What do I need to eat when preparing for a competition?

Each competition and sport will be different but you will need to have a look at the following.

Meal sizes
Number of meals
Macronutrient breakdown
Fast/slow burning foods
Meal timing

I will be discussing all of this and more in this blog, so make sure you keep reading!

Check out the infographic below from Precision Nutrition, as you can see this shows you how you should be measuring each macronutrient serving.

This is a quick and easy to read infographic of how much is in a portion of each macronutrient and your vegetables!

Before a competition you will want to be fuelled as best as you can, to achieve your best results.

Your two main aims before a competition are to:

Fill muscle and liver glycogen stores.
Keep well hydrated.

If you can achieve these two, you will be well on your way to achieving your best results!

Meal sizes:

Your meals should be relatively large, depending on what sort of competition you are competing in.

For a run, cycle or any other cardio based competition you will want a large amount of carbohydrate on your plate, increasing your meal size slightly.

Competition such as weight lifting you will need to balance your meals, meaning you will need a moderate amount of carbohydrates, you should have some protein too! You will want a moderate amount of carbohydrates so your body does not break down the protein in your muscles for energy.

Number of meals:

If you have increased your meal sizes already you may not need to add more meals to your day. You will need to increase your calories. You can eat more meals, with less in each meal or less meals with more food in each meal.

Nutrition for heavy training session.

Make sure you are well hydrated, and have water with you.

If you are training at a high intensity your body will more than likely sweat and release fluids. You will want to have water to replenish the fluids lost.

Before:

If you are training in an endurance manner, meaning your training session will be on for more than 90 mins at a steady pace (E.G running), you will want to have a carbohydrate rich meal 1-2 hours before your training, this hour will allow your body to start digesting the food and you will be able to use it as energy when training.

During:

You should also have some sort of food or carbohydrate drink during your training session if it goes on for more than 90 minutes. Carbohydrate drinks come in small sachets which are rich in carbohydrates. This will help your body train for longer and keep your pace up.

After:

You will need to have some sort of recovery snack or meal. Ideally your snack/meal should be rich in carbohydrates to replenish glycogen stores and also contain some protein for muscle protein synthesis. You should also replenish any electrolytes lost. A very small amount of salt in your water will help replenish any sodium lost!

If you are competing in a race such as running or cycling, you will not need as much fats in your diet, this is because fats are a slow burning fuel. You use the majority of fats when you are resting or sleeping.

If you are competing in a weight lifting competition you should include a small amount of fats when preparing for competition, like everyone!

Everyone will need to include fats in their diet.

Before your competition.

3-4 days before your competition you will need to increase your carbohydrate intake.

These last few days before your race are vital, you shouldn’t skip any meals!

This is your last chance to make sure you are prepared for your competition as best as you can.

The day before your competition you should be:

Eating complex carbohydrates
Plenty of fluids
Avoid high fatty foods or oily foods
Avoid alcohol

The day of your competition:

You may feel some nerves before your competition and this is normal, signs of pre-competition nerves are:

Reduced appetite
Nausea
Diarrhea
Stomach cramps

If you feel you cannot eat or you have a reduced appetite you should try having the following foods.

Porridge
Yogurt
Fruit smoothies
Custard
Pureed fruit

These foods are easy to consume and easy to digest as well, if you are feeling hungry before a competition try to drink some water first. Water helps to break down food and turn it into energy.

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Why are healthy foods so important?

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

Mood

Firstly, eating healthy foods can boost your mood very easily and quickly! I know for me when I have a solid few days of good nutrition my mood is a lot better. Give it a go and let me know how you feel after eating healthy foods. Boosting your mood not only makes you feel good, but you will have more motivation and lots more energy to go about your day. Instead of wandering around wondering, what should I do. Imagine not being tired all the time and having the energy to go out and do a workout or a walk/run etc. You would feel great!

Grow Stronger

Secondly, it allows your body to grow and develop stronger. This is extremely important for young kids as their bodies are still growing so the right nutrition and foods will help them accelerate. Bad or junk food is unavoidable for many people however this shouldn’t be taken granted of. Small amounts of these foods should be taken as a treat not a snack. For adults you still need food to help your body, and healthy nutritional foods especially. You need to gain back energy someway and healthy eating and getting the correct amount will help you with this.

Eating Healthy can Reduce The Risk of Diseases

Another point, and probably one of the most important ones is, it reduces your risk to so many dieses. Such as obesity, some cancers, high blood pressures and also strokes and heart diseases. Imagine you could reduce your risk of getting these diseases. Well you can! Although you cannot prevent them, healthy eating and a good nutrition are brilliant ways to reduce your risk. I can’t tell you how important healthy eating is!!

Eating Healthy Foods can Improve Sleep

The last point for this has to be sleep. Everyone needs sleep to function, but not many people get a good sleep every night. Healthy eating and the right foods can help with this drastically, if you eat “junk” or “rubbish” your body will not be able to function to its best ability therefore reducing the quality of your sleep. So the next time you can’t sleep try to think about what you ate that day!

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Photos downloaded from Pexels

If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see a blog about, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com

How to fuel your body!

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

All of us love to have those cheat days. We have to make sure that other than “those days” we eat properly and fuel our body correctly. Everyone’s body is different but there are a few similarities. Just to clarify, you don’t have to stick to these exact numbers, these are all just a guideline.

On a normal day you should eat at least 7 servings of fruit and vegetables but the more the merrier you should aim for 10!

You should also aim to have at least 2 liters of water every single day. A glass of water in the morning is a great way to start your day.

Check out how much calories you should be having daily here!

Now we will have a look at our essential caloric macronutrients!

Carbohydrates

Our bodies main source of energy, so getting the correct amount of carbohydrates is very important. Having around 45%-60% of your calorie intake as carbs is a good idea. On activity days such as, races, events or even training, it is a good idea to eat a sufficient amount of carbohydrates this will help your body work harder for longer as it has the correct fuel and a good amount of it. Although carbs are great, you have to make sure you don’t over eat them, this can lead to an unbalanced diet. Keep reading to find out about our other macronutrients.

Proteins

Are made up of amino acids, we can get protein from foods such as- lean meat, eggs, fish, yogurt, cheese, seeds etc. HBV proteins are foods that contain all of the essential amino acids. Foods that have a HBV are mainly animal based foods, although soya is a HBV food. Soya is the only plant based food that contains all of our essential amino acids.

There are three types of proteins

Essential, which are the proteins that we need to get from out diet as our body cannot produce them.
Non-essential, proteins out body can produce on its own.
Conditionally essential, meaning we only need them some times.

The intake of protein can vary from person to person but a rule we have is “do not have more then 2g per kilogram per day.” What this means is that if you weigh 80kg you should not have more then 160g of protein per day.

Fats

They are also a macronutrient meaning we need a large supply but we need to understand how much we need and the types we should have. First of all fats are divided into saturated and unsaturated, unsaturated fats are further divided down into monounsaturated and polyunsaturated.

Text Box: Olives, nuts and seeds and avocado

Omega 3 is a type of fat that can be found in oily fish. You should aim for 2 servings of oily fish per week. Types of oily fish include: salmon, mackerel, trout, pilchards and sardines. Although fish is a good source of food with a HBV and is low in unsaturated fat, there are some health risks. Fish contains methylmercury which is bad for our health, however small amounts of methylmercury is safe for our health. High mercury fish include: shark, swordfish, marlin etc.

A rule of thumb is, the larger the fish, the more mercury it has in its system. This is because the larger fish eat smaller fish therefore taking in the small fishes mercury as well as its own.

A rough figure is to have fats as 20%-30% of your total calorie intake. This is a good figure to have a balanced diet and fuel your body is the best way possible. Although this can vary from person to person.

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How to balance life with nutrition, exercising, sleep and recovery!

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

Throughout this blog I’m going to be talking about how you can balance your:

-Sleep

-Nutrition

-Exercising

-Recovery

We all have busy schedules but we should all try to fit the above, into our day. Whether that means getting up earlier, prepping food for a few days in advance, cutting down on the amount of commitments you have or just learning to balance them all in the short 24 hours we have in a day.

How to Balance Sleep.

We should all get around 8 hours of sleep a day, for many people this is a huge amount and for others this is normal. If your not getting around 8 hours a night your body just cannot function properly. If you feel you need more or less then 8 hours that is perfectly fine, if you are getting good quality sleep and your body can function on those hours then there is nothing stopping you. Check the list below and see do you fall into any of these factors.

Tired all the time
No motivation
Hungry a lot
Black bags under your eyes
Lack of concentration

If you feel you have any of these symptoms then my recommendation would either to go asleep at an earlier time or reduce the amount of ‘screen time’ before you go asleep. Everyone probably heard this before, don’t go on your phone an hour before you go asleep, and it’s true. If you watch a device before going to bed, and you reduce this, you will have a more beneficial sleep, with less distraction and most likely have more energy the following day.

What to do if your “sleep schedule is a mess”

Try these tips:

Turn your phone off before you go to bed.
Set an alarm for when you should go to sleep.
Wake up at time that will allow you to get everything done that day and have the energy to do it.
Write out an actual planner, this can be as simple or as complex as you want. Include the quality of your sleep, how busy you were that day and if you had healthy foods that day, as nutrition can also play a huge part in sleep.

How to Balance Nutrition

crop person pouring seasoning on appetizers — Pexels.com

I know when people hear nutrition they think it’s an “effort”, and it does take time but it will help you achieve your goals. Having a good nutrition means you’re getting the essential nutrients, minerals and making sure your body has enough sufficient fuel. Meaning it isn’t filled with junk food.

But don’t panic, I’m here to help. With a few simple tricks you will be able to manage what you eat, a lot better and be able to keep it up long term.

If you want to lose weight or even tone up, the chances are you most likely thought about cutting out all sugar, all carbs. Seems like a good idea?

WRONG!!!!

If you want to achieve your goals and keep it up, you have to choose a plan that you can stick to long term, (this is one of the hardest parts).

Unfortunately there is no one size fits all but you will be able to adjust the following tips and information to balance lifestyle better.

Check out these tips!

Tip 1!

Plan out your meals.

If you have a plan of what your going to do and when it will be a lot easier for you to fulfil. Check out a planner below. If you feel you cannot decide on healthy meals then check out the recipes online you can then filter in what you would like to search for. E.G pasta, burgers, snacks etc.

Tip 2!

Prep your meals.

Ok you have your plan for the week, but you are busy during the week. What are you going to do?!!

Prep out your meals. For example if your working Monday to Friday then on a Sunday, prep your meals and put them in reusable containers so all you have to do it cook it or heat it up when you come home. This saves time, effort and will help you to eat healthier, more nutritional meals.

Tip 3!

Think simple.

Not everyone is a world class chef like Gordon Ramsay so it is your job to cook something that you are able to cook well. There is so many simple healthy recipes online, go check them out!

How to Balance Exercising

Definition of exercise: “Activity requiring physical effort, carried out to sustain or improve health and fitness”

*dictionary.com

Maintaining a healthy lifestyle means both eating healthy and exercising. If you don’t like exercising then you may struggle with these tips but check out the blog getting started with exercise.

Here are a few tips to help you keep going with your fitness, exercise etc.

Tip 1!

Do not over do it!

You do not need to be in the gym everyday and then cardio on top of that. All this will do is damage your muscles as you aren’t giving them time to recover and it will decrease your motivation to keep going with exercise. Stick to 3-4 exercise days a week, maybe 2 in the gym and 1 or 2 cardio such as running, cycling or even a home workout.

Tip 2 !

Track your progress!

By tracking your progress you will be able to see how far you have come helping you to continue. If you don’t see much of a difference physically see if you feel better, have more confidence etc.

Tip 3 !

Get help off others!

If you are working hard and can’t see results you mightn’t be doing the right exercises or maybe not doing them correctly. Get help off someone. If you need a hand make sure to give me an email.

I know a lot of people don’t want to go to the gym as they may prefer to do their exercises and workouts in the comfort of their own home, if you are one of these you may feel that there is little you can do.

You are wrong, there is so much you can do in the comfort of your own home.

Check out any home-workouts on YouTube. Someone who I find great is Joe Wicks, the body coach here!

How to Manage Your Recovery

crop woman massaging neck with balls by leaning on wall — Pexels.com

This to me is probably one of the most important but most lacked out of everything in this blog. If you are exercising there is no way around it, your muscles need recovery time.

When you come back from an exercise or workout you should eat within 30 mins to replenish your glycogen stores for optimal recovery.

You should have a mix of carbs, proteins and some fats. Carbohydrates contain glycogen which will help you regain energy, protein rebuilds muscles and helps give results from your exercise.

Glycogen is stored as energy in your body, but an excess will be stored as triglycerides which will then be stored as fat.

Fats on the other hand should be taken in very small amounts or even none at all, the reason is, fats are a slow burning fuel and does not affect muscles protein synthesis or glycogen replenishment.

Good snacks for recovery are:

Low fat-Chocolate milk.

Bananas.

Nuts and seeds.

If you are planning on having a meal after a workout:

Pasta.

Potatoes.

Chicken.

Beef.

These are just a few recovery food ideas, make sure you change it up to balance your diet.

Recovery does not mean just after your workout that day, you will need at least 2 rest days during the week.

If you are worried about not exercising then maybe go for a small light walk, this will keep your body active but you are not exercising intensely.

But do not think that you have to workout 5-6 days a week, that is for athletes and professionals.

Maybe you workout 2-3 times a week, maybe once a week or maybe even none at the moment.

You will need recovery days if you exercise, plan these at the start of your week so you know exactly when your body can relax and rebuild for the next activity.

Exercise planner

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A quick guide to loosing weight!

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

Loosing weight

Loosing weight can be very difficult, you should look at being in a calorie deficit first. Check out that blog here!

When you are in a calorie deficit you should then look at exercising. Exercises can be tough but just do whatever you can!

Don’t forget to warm up before exercising, you do not want to get injured and push yourself back, if you are injured check out this blog here!

Exercises for loosing weight:

Walking/jogging/running.
Cycling
Elliptical

Cardio based exercises are great for burning off a bit of body fat!

HIIT workouts, (High Intensity Interval Training.) These workouts are made by working out for a certain amount of time then resting for another amount of time.

Exercises that are typically included in HIIT workouts are:

Side plank (both sides)
Lunges
Press ups
Crunches
Plank
High knees

Find some HIIT workouts below on The Body Coach TV

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAxW1XT0iEJo0TYlRfn6rYQ

When you are working out, you want to sweat it out as much as possible, you want to maximize your workout. Leave no fuel in the tank!

For some workout motivation check out this blog here!

Tips for healthy weight loss:

Make sure you get lots of fluids on board while you are working out.
More carbohydrates, less fats!
More high fibre foods!
Do not skip meals
Have snacks rather than treats.
Regular exercise days.
Track calories.
Calorie deficit.
More cardio exercises.
DO NOT GO ON A MAD DIET, the chances are you will not stick to this and you will put back on weight straight after. You want to have a way of eating a balanced diet, but one you will stick too.

Loosing weight can be a long, stressful road but you will get your results eventually. When you do, you will never have felt better! Keep going, results will come!

If you are looking at loosing weight and you feel you need a little bit of help, email me and I will be more than happy to help you in any ways I can!

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Nutrition for injury and illness!

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

Illness and injury are not preventable but here are a few ways you can lower your risk, and boost a speedy recovery!

Unfortunately some times, people get injured while exercising this can be for a number of reasons:

A fall or other accident
Poor nutrition
Lack of sleep
Over exercising

Note, that people who train at high or low intensity are at greater risk of infection than people who train at a moderate level.

Although if you are an elite athlete for a longer time, your body will begin to adapt and fight off infections easier.

Accidental injury, E.G broken bone, fractured bone etc

Recovery for injury- Stage 1

crutches against light white wall — Pexels.com

Take time off, you do not want to damage yourself anymore with more long lasting effects!

Lots of protein, protein is now your best friend. You will need more protein then before as your body will use up more protein to help rebuild your body.

However if you lacked protein intake before injury, your recovery time may be extended, this is why it is so important to have a sufficient amount of protein. You should be having protein every 3-4 hours during the day if injured. Find a list of protein rich foods here!

Sufficient amount of carbs, as you may know already, carbohydrates are our bodies main source of fuel. However if carbohydrates are not present our body will begin to break down protein to use as energy, we do not want this as our body needs the protein to help recovery.

Calories go down, seen as you are not exercising anymore your body will not as many calories. However your body uses up a large amount of calories when recovering meaning you need less calories than a training day but more calories than a rest day.

Micronutrient intake, when you are injured, you will need to get your correct micronutrient intake as it is very important for the rebuilding of the body. Vitamin D and Calcium play a vital role in healing injuries such as bone damage. Vitamin C and Zinc aids collagen synthesis, which is important for the repair of ligaments, tendons and also helps with bone repairment.

Rehabilitation- Stage 2

Woman holding dumbbells in a resistance exercise

Resistance exercise, after your injury has healed, you move on to the next step. Rehabilitation this is when you begin to ease yourself back into exercise and start increasing strength. Resistance training includes using resistance bands for exercises, pull ups, push ups. They are exercises that uses your body weight or weights. These types of exercises are great for building back strength after injury.

More protein, you are still going to be having a large quantity or protein to regain any muscle lost. You should have some HBV foods as well.

Illnesses E.G, inflammation, infections.

syringe and pills on blue background — Pexels.com

Causes: unhygienic conditions, raw food, low immune system.

When you train in high intensities your immune system lowers, meaning you are more susceptible to illnesses and diseases.

How to lower your risk of infection:

Wash hands regularly.

Do not share food or water.

Do not drink water from taps.

Sufficient micronutrient nutrient intake.

Carbohydrates taken before, during and after a workout, (these studies were mainly done on endurance athletes.)

What to do if you catch an infection

Probiotics, probiotics are a type of bacteria that lives in the gut. This is a good bacteria, probiotics help your body fight off infections and diseases. Probiotic rich foods are, yogurt sourdough, cheeses, soybeans, tempeh.

Avoid sugar and trans-fats, sugar helps the bad bacteria grow in your gut which could mean you have a unbalanced gut in terms of good and bad bacteria. You should also decrease the amount of trans-fats you are eating as trans-fats increases inflammation.

Take more anti-inflammatory foods, these include tuna, salmon, chia seeds, flaxseeds, turmeric, ginger, green tea, dark chocolate. Omega-3 rich foods reduce inflammation greatly, that is why tuna, salmon chia seeds are on the list of foods you should eat!

More antioxidants foods, your colourful fruit and vegetables such as tomatoes, peppers, all your berries ( blueberries, strawberries etc.). Your green, blue, yellow, orange, red fruit and veg!

Extra fluids, you should be taking on more fluids if sick to help the body function to its best ability and prevents dehydration.

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If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see a blog about, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com

How to start exercising!

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

Exercising can be very enjoyable but getting started is a big struggle;

Where will you start? When will I start? What if I’m not very good at it?

Everyone has to start somewhere, if you feel nervous starting or maybe you just don’t know where to start this blog is for you!

Here is a few tips to get you exercising!

When starting you start off slow and very easy, work your way up! Go at your own pace. Maybe you are naturally good at sports or are athletically fit. In this case you may have an advantage to other people but remember, everyone works their way up!

Set out your own workout plan, set the days you are going to workout and stick to them!

Ask a friend or a family member to start up with you. If you can’t get anyone to start with you maybe join a group or a gym.

Running groups are great for people who already run and for people who are only starting out!

Many gyms run classes or training groups, this can be a great opportunity to join, exercise, reach your goals and maybe make some new friends on the way!

“Test the waters”. Before joining a running group or paying for a gym membership see if you like that exercise. If it’s running for example, try get out running for a week or two and see do you enjoy it.

If you don’t enjoy it move on to something else you enjoy, but remember no pain no gain, so bare this in mind!

Eating correctly. Although you are only starting out, if you eat properly and fuel your body correctly you will find it easier to workout and you will begin to see results quicker!

Exercise in the comfort of your own home. Working out at home is a good way to start your exercising career, this can also be easier to keep up!

Check out some HIIT sessions, abdominal sessions, fat burning sessions and more on “Joe Wicks the Body Coach”

crop woman with laptop and dumbbell on sports mat — Pexels.com

Finally my favourite topic to talk about, motivation. Surround yourself with motivation and the urge to get up and go!

Some days you may feel tired and lack energy but here are a few ways to get motivated to start working out.

Motivation for exercising

-Pick a goal you want to achieve.

-Listen to motivational music. A playlist I listen to on Spotify that really gets me going, find it here!

-Keep remembering why you started.

-Watch some short motivational speeches.

-Reward yourself, of course everyone needs a treat sometimes so rewarding yourself after an achievement is a great way to help your body to keep going.

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If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see a blog about, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com

How to reach your calorie goals!

August 30, 2020December 29, 2020nutravice admin

Reach your calorie goals with this blog!

If you are trying to gain weight then you are most likely in a calorie surplus. If not, then you should definitely look at doing so.

This does not however mean you should go and eat a load of junk food. It simply means you eat more of the healthier foods, this will help prevent high blood pressure and other diseases in the body.

Gaining weight may look easy for some people but it can have its challenges like, not knowing what to eat, when to eat, how much is too much etc.

I will go through all of that in this blog.

Heres a list of food to help you reach your calorie target, in a healthy way!

Smoothies/shakes. This is a great opportunity to add in lots of fruit, veg, nuts, yogurt. A smoothie is a great and easy way to bump up your calories and to also get in your fruit and vegetables.

clear glass cup, help with gaining weight — Pexels.com

Meat. A great source of protein and can also be high in calories. Mix in a few vegetables, pasta, rice with a bit of sauce.

Protein or breakfast bars. These usually contain around 200-300 calories per bar. You may not take it as a meal replacement but rather as a snack.

top view photo of granola bars — Pexels.com

Avocados. Avocados are a great source of monounsaturated fats and contain around 250 calories each. Try some avocado on toast, getting in a good source of fats and carbs.

basil leaves and avocado on sliced bread on white ceramic plate, — Pexels.com

Stir-fry. It is a good high calorie meal. You have noodles, chicken, vegetables maybe some chips. A wide range of food and also high in calories.

brown chopsticks on brown bowl, full of calories to gain weight — Pexels.com

Now that you know the foods you should be eating, lets move on to some tips.

Fill the plate, make sure you don’t go easy at meal times because this is your best chance to add in a few more calories. Add some chips, vegetables, larger portions.

Eat regularly, rather then 3 meals maybe have 4-5.

Eat more carbohydrates and fats.

Foods such as;

Carbohydrates: grains, breads pasta, noodles, rice.

Fats: avocados, oils, almond butter, cashew butter, almonds.

If you exercise make sure to add back on the calories you burned. Reduce the fat burning exercises, try some muscle building exercises like weight lifting. This will help you ‘bulk up’.

When trying to gain weight you can eat at any time you feel hungry.

In order to gain weight you have to make sure you reach your calorie goals!

How much is too much? When you decide on gaining weight you should set yourself a weight goal, a realistic number of what you would like your weight to be. Set this as your goal and reach for that.

Check out the calorie calculator on my website. This will give you your recommended calorie intake to either loose, maintain or gain weight.

All photos are from https://www.pexels.com!

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If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com